[A Swim off the Rocks is] a superb book of light verse, which culminates in a marvelous poem, not so very light, called Horror Movie, with its sublime closing couplet: "Make the blood flow, make the motive muddy: / There's a little death in everybody." (p. 23)

Harold Bloom, "The Year's Books: (Part I)," in The New Republic (reprinted by permission of The New Republic; © 1976 The New Republic, Inc.), Vol. 175, No. 21, November 20, 1976, pp. 20, 22-3, 26.∗